How Many Forms and Techniques Does it Take to Master Karate?
When I first started the martial arts, a branch of Chinese American Kung Fu Kenpo Karate, I was told it would take three lifetimes to master Karate. Over time I realized that this was just a variety of ignorance, and even racism, but I did start to wonder how long it would take. I’ve been practicing for over forty years now, and I think I have an answer. Sort of. The common sense I have encountered, over the years, is that it takes a 1000 repetitions to learn a form, and 10,000 repetitions to master. This would include, of course, practical applications, appropriate types of freestyle, assorted drills, and so on. Taking just the karate forms, you can increase the numbers I am about to tell you according to your individual method of training, we can come up with some interesting times to mastery. If you have 15 forms to Mastery, which is close to the number of forms in such arts as Wado ryu karate, goju ryu karate, and so on, then you need to do 15,000 repetitions. 15,000 forms = 15,000
